There's the link. I'm not sure how this will work. Let's face it; I'm new and I don't know many people at all. I'm deep in my craft so I don't network much. Still, I decided to try a campaign to see if I can actually interest people in my latest series.
Until Christmas, the campaign will take preorders. Once it's over, I can either choose from the interested publishers or I can dissolve the campaign (preorders won't gets charged) and petition publishers\agents myself. Whatever happens, I'm determined to make it happen.
Okay, I'm determined to make a lot of things happen. I know that. Comic books are still one of those things. I love drawing and I don't suck at it. I have stories to tell and I don't suck at it. I do intend to at least finish the stories and series I've started before throwing my weight into comics. It would be stupid of me to not use the talents I have to find my niche.
It's hard for artists to ever "make it." I know a couple of successful artists even though I know a ton of talented ones. They all work hard and they all work smart, but it's largely about luck. And who you know. Which is a big ouch for me. I'm a small circle kind of gal and not an elbow rubber at that.
I can only hope that somewhere along the way, I can make a decent living at it. We'll see. Like I said, I'm new and luck is fickle.
If you want to help, be sure to share the link on social media. I share everywhere I can, but of course I love what I do. Secondhand support is always valuable!
So I began a new process this week in my quest for being a published author with zero budget-- the art of beggaring reviewers to critique my work. You can find compilations of lists online sorting reviewers by genre (a list I'm happy to share for anyone interested). Spent an entire day sorting through one such list, just going by genre and availability. There are all sorts of caveats, and rightly so, since it can be difficult to make the waiting list for a freely offered service, especially when all you have to give is a free review copy. Some will strictly list genres they prefer, some will annoyingly put All Genres (and then tell you you've wasted your effort).
Some insist you fill out a contact form on their site to ask first, some want you to go ahead and attach a copy. These are the ones that I whiled away most of my time on since it's not a uniform list. I was happier for the ones that were just an email, a request that you send a copy, no guarantee for a review.
Now, one thing I like to get is critical feedback, you know this. However, one such reviewer, instead of just denying the application silently, felt entitled to send a message that very briefly informed me they read whatever sample floats on merchant pages and just sent 'your writing is clunky and too telling. Your book won't be a good fit for me.' Not only is that an incredibly ambiguous assessment, it was wholly unnecessary. It only gave me the impression that this person valued their tastes as expertise and feels it necessary to impress themselves upon someone who is making an earnest effort. I hope to fill the market with such clunky and telling books in the future regardless. What I could appreciate here is that I'm glad this person jumped ship early and spared me whatever purple prose of a negative review they intended to feel entitled to. It may be their time I ask for, but let's not forget, my risk and time was certainly not small either.
Another email I got back simply said they'd review it within seven days. Cool. I can appreciate hearing back when it's productive. Most reviewers posted that they wouldn't notify you either if they decide to read it or if they post it. I only picked reviewers that said they'd give honest feedback and again, most said they still wouldn't give less than 3 Stars on their system because 2 stars is akin to being nearly unreadable and 1 Star means they absolutely couldn't finish it. As an artist, I'm no stranger to rejection letters, but if I'm going to hear back, I'd rather it be productive or not at all. I'm just not fond of what amounts to spam and degradation in some pseudo-official capacity. Stay out of my lane, girl...
Most artists grow a rather thick skin to criticism, but it does exact a toll. You often see those reports in the news of the 'perfectly happy artist showing no signs of what led to their overdose or demise.' Don't read too much into this; with all the grief I've been through lately, I'm still determined and not at all complacent towards the reality of the ups and down. Still, I get it. When you put yourself out there as a professional, part of your brand is likability. Letting people see you moping with your doubts can hurt your marketability. It's not to say you aren't experiencing real happiness, gratefulness, success. There is just always that undercurrent of anxiety when you are constantly banking on the instability of trends, personality, and taste. Your fans can turn on you at any minute, your sales could drop, your smile can slip.
First and foremost, critics be damned, I started this journey to make friends, not fans. I didn't obsessively study the market to find what covers sell and I didn't emulate popular authors to write. I didn't overhaul my art to reflect the trends toward realism. I simply put a piece of myself out there, knowing the vulnerabilities it would leave me open to. You might call it brave or reckless or risky, but I felt complete for having done all of this my way and not always working under the mentality of 'I bet people will love this.' Sure, I love to hear it when they do, but I spent years sitting on my talents and ideas and it was time to take the risk.
I want to say that I apologize if you get sick of hearing about my anecdotes and stories, but remember, I'm a reclusive sort of introvert and much of my experience is about self-reflection and internalizing. I do hope that my experience with this journey brings me out of my shell more, gives me more to share. It's still so newborn! Only two months since I published that first book and, wow, the things you learn in so little time. Also consider that I do not talk about myself in all the endless month and years I spend working on stories and novels. This might be your only exposure to my writing thus far and whatever I've said about myself is miniscule in comparison to the time I spend developing characters.
On closing, I might understand what that reviewer had been hinting at. The beginning of my book is very purposely abrupt and, yes, sometimes I absolutely describe a character right out of the gate, especially when it has a profound effect on another character. I also realized that I may not have published my final edit where I had made some minor corrections to word choice, particularly a couple that I found in the first sample chapter. I've gotten better about sorting my files since and I will have corrections to make when I release a compilation. If it's my style she doesn't like, she's out of luck. I don't fill my pages with flowery prose. There are some exceptional writers out there that I could only read once because they used too much filler for my tastes, so I nipped that in the bud.
Like I said, everyone's a critic. Me too. You just won't ever catch me brushing someone off in less a paragraph. And like my dear friend said, no matter how good something is, you'll always catch someone trying to find something wrong with it.
Don't invest more consideration into any criticism than the time spent on making it and you'll be fine.
It's not just about self-promotion! Sometimes you really just want to help out a few friends who could use some traffic and someone to take a gamble on them. Today, I'm featuring Joe Maley, Matt Roberts, and Ditrie Bowie. I suggest you check them out and I'll tell you why...
Straight to the front page of the channel for you. If you missed my last blog post "On Brain Graveyards", I brought up why you need to give him a serious watch. He doesn't fancy himself a creative type, but that's also what is endearing. He's down-to-earth and he doesn't overload you with his biases. You'll know his taste, how it compares to other movies you might have been interested in, and what you might get out of it. He might joke about ratings, but you never feel guilty about disagreeing. I'd love to go on and on about it, but see it for yourself!
Matt Roberts is a horror enthusiast and knows his shit. Despite my being credited for the cover, this is all his show. It's his first entry as a novelist, but he is also active as a NaNoRiMo participant when he can and the 13 Stories gig. (If you're reading this, Matt, I'm happy to post some side links). He's always wanted to be a writer and it shows in the dedication and talent. His blog often features funny videos and rants on his experience as an Uber driver, to name a couple. I'm not even a horror fan in particular, but I really dig his work.
Again, this is someone who has creative writing in the bag. Our acquaintance started as classmates at Full Sail where she was earning a degree in creative writing while teaching music at the Savannah Arts Academy. I've had the pleasure of reading her blogs and she is light, humorous, and contemporary, making subtle life observations that encourage you to delight in the simple things. She's passionate about charity and even made a page on FaceBook where she helps other writers gain momentum. In fact, she gave Matt a nice springboard when he was starting out. Again, I'd love to post more direct links since she has had some great blogs out there. She's an ecclectic writer so she's everywhere and I'd need a little help narrowing it down!
I don't have a lot of traffic on this newborn blog, but every little bit helps! I'd love to keep featuring artists that are clearly in it for the enjoyment and whose talent I can vouch for.
Often, the reclusive artist doesn't have these amazing stories to tell (outside of the stories they are diligently pounding out on a keyboard already), so the inspiration for a blog post usually has more humble beginnings. In this case, "brain graveyards" are something that often come up for my creative friends and I and worth some introspection and maybe advice.
First, let me plug one of my friend Joe's current YouTube videos. Personally, I think videos are something that take a lot of courage. You not only do you have to have a clear voice and an enthusiastic tone, you have to have a topic interesting enough that you can talk about it with finesse. I myself am not an avid movie goer, but I always find his insights and banter charming and witty. He's always been passionate about it and his reviews don't tell you to like or dislike, he just lets you know if it might be the movie for you. He always has these little tidbits of fact that I enjoy and he's adventurous. Sometimes he does single shot videos where he researched it and scripted it to add more, sometimes he's with a friend or two and they banter about it. There's also a rum-laced version. He's always thinking of new ways to present his ideas and I'm really happy to save his video line-up for a cookie-baking day.
And how can you resist those pretty faces?
That being said, back to the topic at hand-- brain graveyards. It's a term that can take on a lot of forms, but for the artist breaking into a new endeavor, the struggle is real. In this case, it often has little to do with the creative. Your friends and family are along for the ride and you've even picked up a couple of curious pioneers. You absolutely love your fanbase, but when it's so difficult to pick up more visibility, you start to wonder what you're doing wrong.
And you're not doing anything wrong. Society is burdened with choice, the market is skeptical, you're probably promoting anywhere you can as subtly as possible. Still, you're having those times when you aren't seeing the numbers move. Your work is wonderful in its own right, but what else can you do?
In my case, a lot of my visibility efforts have shifted away from just the posting on social media. Of course, most of my efforts to put my toe in the water take time to bear fruit. In October, I'm promoting my first ebook as free for the first five days. I would have loved to do for a full month, but I will keep using that promotion whenever I can. This won't be of much help to my friends that are already offering their work for free and just allow people to make donations. If you are offering your work free and don't have that set-up, do it. Attach your link to everything. I have also had an interview with a reputable book blogger, the lovely Cynthia A. Morgan over at Booknvolume, who likes to use her traffic to help other new artists gain visibility. I will link that on October 8th when it is published. I also queued up for a virtual convention Virtual FantasyCon, which is a relatively new platform where fantasy authors are coming together on social media to gain visibility and interact with people who might be curious about what new and established authors are doing in the genre. It's certainly not for lack of effort. I'm always looking at local writers' conventions and I've considered collaborative efforts as well as fanfic and competitions. I have a plan, but...
Even I have those moments of doubt. I am confident in my work, ready to defend my choices and styles and output, but another rare commodity is constructive feedback. It's hard to ask people to dedicate their time towards inspection and promotion. Sometimes they're hesitant to tell you what's bad and sometimes they really enjoy it and there's little to say about how you can improve (even though there's no way something is perfect-- some people just don't want to nitpick and cheapen the good experience).
The brain graveyard starts burying things like confidence and unearths doubts and fears. While it's not good to entirely bottle those feelings up, you are now a brand, a business, and you have to carefully choose how you voice those doubts. Blogging is a great way to express your very human fragility, but under no circumstances are you to make your current fans feel less important or valid by screaming 'WHY IS NOBODY BUYING THIS?!' They aren't 'nobody' and even the ones that did not pay or review, their personal experience and support is equally if not MORE valuable in the long run. Despite your frustrations, share it with the market, don't downgrade your current fanbase.
Marketing itself is super tricky. There's only so much you want to hit social media without getting yourself unfollowed/unfriended/ignored for the tactless way you attack people with information. Post about the harder facts, the releases, the promotions, your gratefulness for the support. Use your outlets wisely. There are still people out there that need the thrill of discovery, to believe that finding you was what they needed. That is never something you can force on people. When you are doing all of the work yourself, you are often NOT going to be the best advocate. Of course, you believe in your work, but how much does it resonate with the people you're marketing to?
There are other brain graveyards, pitfalls that stem from your slow emergence. Those creative blocks, those dips in motivation. I know it's not so simple as just silencing them, but pick up your preferred method of expression and just start doing. This is where blogging and fanfic excel for me. Keep doing things where the only reward is learning and doing. Remember, the minute your frustration turns to the people that didn't 'fall in line,' you're going to lose people. They cannot force their friends and family to like you; in fact, they may be the black sheep even among their closest circles and their niche tastes are already tolerated, but not embraced. Yes, word of mouth is important, but it needs very specific and sincere voice to be of any use.
I absolutely enjoy giving advice on this. I'm not someone who is above this struggle and I have a lot to learn myself, but I will tell you, you are going to have to discipline your attitude. People want to see your passion for your work and you can't confuse them by assaulting them with your doubt. If they want that innermost dialogue, they know where to go. If they want to see your events, they have the links. If they don't have time, respect that time. They're not out to get you or see you fail, they just have their own struggles. Be grateful when someone says they want to put your book on their shelf in the future. Thank them, leave it at that, believe that that day will come and not in your acceptable windows. I know you've probably already told yourself a lot of these things, but read them again and make them into a mantra. On my tablet, I actually have a memo widget on the screen where my first to-do is :
"No brain graveyards! You are talented, you are loved, you are necessary."
Because it's easy to forget that. It's so damn easy to forget the little things, to let it cloud your passion and what you put into it. It's not because you're stupid or worthless or people hate you. You are self-criticizing because maybe some practical part of you started comparing yourself to someone else's success or your reasonable expectations gave way to impatience. Even the most seasoned artists to do it. Take inventory. Your inventory may not be long. Personally, I am proud I have degrees in my field that gave me the knowledge to self-publish and design. I am proud of the courage it took to say it's finally ready after x amount of years falling in love with it over and over again. Hell, you can even be a little negative and say "Even though there are technically better artists, I love my style and I want to share it."
Don't sit in dark places. Name them and put them behind you. Even without knowing you or your skill level, you always have room to improve, to adopt the right attitudes, to apologize and acknowledge you are still learning. Do your work anonymously sometimes, find visibility through other outlets that don't have your name on it so you can be a little bolder without worrying about how it affects your brand.
Haaaaa, I realize I am using command words, but it's so much easier to state them as something you can do rather than be wishy-washy. You have options that don't include giving up. Grow and learn and don't forget to ignite those passions. I'm pulling for you!
SQUEE! That was the sound I made when I had finally uploaded my first book and hit that button, confirming I was published. This is where most people expect the money to start rolling in and celebrity status is in the bag.
Come on, now, you know better... This was the exact moment I took the link to my book and toddled straight off to FaceBook to spread the joy. It wasn't enough. Where is that Twitter account I had collecting dust... Oh, and LinkedIn... wow, I haven't updated that since my 'Kita-Craftery', an attempt to make a few bucks at crocheting. Check, now what about Goodreads? I know I at least signed up for that...
This is where it started. Plain and simple, I started throwing up my book links, giving my close friends and family a quick heads-up on where to go. I also got my FaceBook page back into usefulness as well as a Patreon page I never used with any seriousness. It makes me glad that I was just the sort of person to sign up for everything because personalizing it was pretty simple past the tedious business of signing up. I simply decided once a week, I'd hit up all of my accounts and remind people.
Only I knew better than to think even THAT would change anything. See, if you read my intro post, then you would know about the crab tank theory. Most people you already know aren't lining up to support you. This doesn't mean you sigh in frustration and quit. Build a network anyway-- give people a million ways to find you, a million ways to express your sincerity. Start delegating certain action to certain accounts. You may want to reserve certain pages for detailed updates-- events, sales, links and so on. Others, like Twitter, are going to be ones you hit for release dates, short and informative. Keep a blog or two-- I like to keep Goodreads blog open for business, but I also use this blog (Blogger, you fill my many, many blogging holes). Blogs are a good way to vent and gush for your superfans and not clog your social media.
My next course of action was to frequent groups in my preferred genre. Notice I added 'preferred.' This is because, no matter how conventional you are, there will always be someone lining up to tell you you are wrong. I went as broad as possible to start and just stuck to fantasy. Fantasy Faction, Fantasy Book Club, kept it simple. I learned very quickly how very divided people are even within a genre. Taste is one thing, but there are some people who are so protective of what they believe the rules of a genre are that they will attempt to classify you. And believe me, sex is a really touchy subject here. There are people who would insist that the minute you combine elements of romance or sex, it is relegated into the trash pile of erotic fantasy. Mind you, I have no ill-will towards the genre, but let me explain this to you. Erotic fantasy is about sexual creativity. You cannot lump epic fantasy, with extensive world building and character development into a genre almost entirely about sexual exploration. You can make it a secondary genre, but if a book takes the time to map out worlds for you, that it simply above and beyond erotic fantasy. So what is it? Lo and behold, we have the ADULT rating. There is no real purpose for that rating in global society except to warn about sexual themes, falling into consensual or not. Violence itself, depending on the severity, often still misses the mark on mature ratings UNLESS IT INVOLVES SEX. Even foul language often falls into pre-adult, again, depending on the level of sexual knowledge involved. Most epic fantasy happens to fall into the young adult category naturally. But let's not discount that grimdark still qualifies as epic fantasy.
I won't beat a dead horse here. You can skip back to my Goodreads blog for my rants on how fans incorrectly classify adult themes. BLOG LINK I only hoped to relate a little of how quickly you can catch onto what your audience is and start to narrow it down.
Another thing that groups lent me? A heads up on where to find more promotional tools! I signed up as an author for Virtual FantasyCon to start. Between October 15-21, I will be available via my event page to let people ask me questions and turn them on to my plans as an author. From that event, I met author Cynthia A. Morgan who runs the Booknvolume blog. She offered to do an Author Spotlight to help increase fantasy author visibility and I am scheduled to have an interview posted there. I find this sequence of events to be serendipitous and unexpected, but having a very strong point. Even if the bickering and chatter of groups can put you off on the whole, this is by far one of the most valuable places for promotion and events I have come across yet.
And I'm not done! There are visual tools to use as well, although I am putting that off for now. My dark circled, bloodshot eyes are not picture friendly, but my priority right now is the timely release of my first trilogy, which may have my attention until the end of the year. With that done and after some serious rest, I plan to use YouTube, Instagram and Snapchat (of which I only have an account on YouTube at the moment) to supplement my brand and platform.
I expect to have a lot of good advice to share with my readers on this process. I want to champion the little ones in this field, encourage people that hard work and skill CAN spell success. Yes, you need a lot of luck too. If hard work were all that was necessary, third world countries would have the rest of us beat. Work smart, not hard? Sorry, that's still not enough. My IQ certainly doesn't hurt, but it's also no guarantee. You can't just be successful by mimicking successful people. Even they are never entirely sure how all the cards lined up. One thing this process has definitely taught me is to be a tireless but clever promoter. Limit your sales reminders to the SMALLEST part of your promotion. I know that sounds counterintuitive, but I've had more luck when I stopped selling a product and started getting people excited for an idea.
One thing I didn't do was make my first ebook free right out of the gate. I wanted to see if it would grab any sales despite my newbie status. And it did, but less than a handful. However, I plan on keeping it a sale item until the release of my second book when I will reduce it to free for the month of October. I've heard a lot of people express that it is more valuable as a way to sell the next book in a series if you develop a genuinely interested audience. Now, I may be a bit non-traditional in my tactics, but that does sound like a completely reasonable assessment. It makes sense to have enough faith in your work to lead people into a series. While it is my only book, it doesn't seem like a good choice to make it free right away, but knowing I planned to release the second two months from then, it seemed smarter to wait to offer that promotion as an incentive.
On a last note, I hope to keep dividing up posts between rants, advice and other categories. I'll attempt to use labels to help anyone find these topics quicker in the future. If I get lax, send me a shoutout and I'll remedy it.
I'll leave you with my current social media links. I'll label this post 'social media' so if I add more accounts, you can find them all here later.
